


Longing Is a Thing with Wings

by sparebonesbarebones



Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn
Genre: Character Study, Cheating, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Prose Poem, conveniently forgot about Mendel so he’s MIA, sorry Mendel, strangely elaborate animal metaphors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-12 22:07:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21233315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sparebonesbarebones/pseuds/sparebonesbarebones
Summary: And Marvin has never caught a butterfly before. Never felt the frantic beating of wings. Never seen the iridescent scales up close. Never enjoyed a fleeting beauty.But the night is young, and rife with possibility.Triptych centred on Marvin, and the early stages of his undoing.





	1. CHRYSALIS

**Author's Note:**

> the Falsettos fandom is half-dead BUT im desperate for attention so here i am regardless. honestly, id be very surprised if anyone decides to read this—pleasantly so! it is all very abstract and vague, hope u enjoy nonetheless. x x

I.

The purpose of a chase is the capture, the victory, not the pursuit itself; here is a lesson Marvin was never taught. (Or at the very least, never paid heed to.)

II.

Marvin chases Him. 

The issue is that He does not want to be caught.

He flitters around; a butterfly, a pretty thing. Almost ornamental. Scales that fluoresce and catch the light. Enough to make one believe a fleeting beauty like that will stay. Enough to fool a grown man into thinking he could mount and frame Him on the wall, preserve Him for eternity and then some. 

Contrary to a butterfly, Marvin is sure that once you touch Him, it is not He who begins to wither. 

And Marvin has never caught a butterfly before. Never felt the frantic beating of wings. Never seen the iridescent scales up close. Never enjoyed a fleeting beauty. 

But the night is young, and rife with possibility. 

Marvin watches Him from afar, calculating. Sips at his beer. Tries to catch His eye across the room. Conversely, He pointedly downs His drink in one go, lithely hops off His barstool, flutters out onto the floor where the ravenous eyes of men cling to every crease of His clothing. Sweating and strutting for these men who are not entirely humans and not entirely sharks. Leering hybrids who size up this attractive morsel. Dorsal fins piercing through tight shirts. Rows upon rows of teeth. 

Marvin could give up, let himself become flotsam and jetsam on the shore. Already, he is decayed. Why shy away from becoming debris? 

Then, from the dancefloor, He looks Marvin dead in the eye. 

And now surrendering to the ocean as a plank of wood is no longer an option. 

A silent exchange passes between them. A wink. A flicker. A promise. Marvin feels as though he is salivating. 

The butterfly takes to the air. 

Marvin waits for a beat, then gives chase. 

III. 

The bathroom Marvin corners Him in is predictably seedy; it’s the least of their concerns. The chase is not yet finished. Marvin finds himself already out of breath anyway. 

He’s unfairly beautiful, this charming insect. Glinting eyes and an elegantly curved neck. Yet there’s an edge to His beauty; a cruelty, brutality to it. A sharpness to His canines that Marvin failed to observe from so far away beforehand. 

He could eat me raw, Marvin thinks. 

He looks Marvin up and down. And He grins. Rows upon rows of teeth. 

If I’m not careful, I’ll let him. 

He illuminates the dingy tiles, and He makes a mockery of the feeble lightbulb, and He says: “wanna go back to mine?” 

And, yes, Marvin does. Marvin wants and wants and can’t have. Marvin plays with fire just to feel it singe. The night is young, and the sky is willing to keep a secret. There is safety to be found in the cloak of shade. 

Marvin replies, “let’s go.”

Just like that, they make themselves scarce. 

Cats blink in streetlights. Dogs bark into the darkness. Rows upon rows of teeth. Moths shiver, then spread their furred wings. Doors are not locked tightly enough. 

The whole world takes a deep breath—

Amongst the sleeping and the waking and the drifters in between, a man cries out, as if in pain. 

—then exhales. 

IV. 

Retrospectively, Marvin should not have been stupid enough to conclude that this was a successful capture on his behalf. Marvin was not seizing Him. Not arresting Him. Not thwarting this butterfly mid-flight. 

This creature is far too vehement to be tied down. 

*


	2. MUTTON

I.   
  


He is not God, but He’s the closest Marvin will ever get to witnessing a divine apparition. He is not the Angel of Death, but Marvin’s doorstep is bloodied regardless. Branded with the ripe virgin blood, still hot, sizzling against the welcome mat. 

Marvin’s wife bleats orders up the stairs on a school morning, hugs woollen jumpers to her breast in winter as she shivers, shrouded in sheepskin. She is cold and Marvin could warm her, could wrap his arms around her until the dark months begin to lighten. Could whisper warm words in her ear. Could kiss her throat, her forehead. Come home in time for dinner, thank her for cooking it. Take his shoes off at the door. 

It’s all a little too late, though, he reckons. 

He’s always forgotten about the shoes. (Now there is a crimson trail from the front door out to the den.) 

  
II.   
  
  


Marvin did not meet her sober. They were loud and joyous and giddy. Her legs had stuttered. Stumbling, tottering, skittering. She was tripping over herself as if she didn’t yet know how to walk, as if Marvin had to help her learn again. He volunteered as her crutch. Chivalry was revived for at least one more night. 

A second revival soon came with a confession; a most miraculous affliction; the new permanence of a crutch, the promise of a ring. 

And—their wedding. Her eyes had widened, her lashes had trembled. Marvin hoped for fondness. Adoration. Anything but this. She didn’t cry, but she was plainly afraid. And it sickened him. In his disquietude, he neglected to hold a door open for her, and, just like that, chivalry died its millionth quiet death. 

_ Shank, rump, forequarter and hindquarter. What is she now, but a lamb to the slaughter?  _

  
  


III. 

  
  


Marvin is a natural disaster and a canary sky and an impending sense of doom. 

But He is not Marvin’s wife, tearful and squirrelled away under the table, waiting for the rattling blinds to calm. Nor is He Marvin’s child, precocious and rash and hurling a chair into the turbulence just to watch it be swallowed up. Neither is He the impassive eye of the blustering Cyclone Marvin, watching listlessly as Marvin runs circles around Him. 

Sometimes, Marvin yells so loudly he imagines the windows bursting. Smashed to smithereens by his voice. Marvin’s wife picking her way through the fragments. The child following in her wake. But it seems that He would just stand, defiant, amongst the wreckage. Blazing like the sun, splintering like the glass. He’d sigh—once—then He’d raise His voice and simply shout louder. 

Presently, it appears that Hurricane Marvin is not the only force to be reckoned with. 

  
IV.   
  
  


It wasn’t meant to happen again. 

Nonetheless, their breath halts synchronously for what is now the third time in as many weeks. 

Neither one is willing to put a name to this, this ritual of theirs. That would be too much. Too soon. 

He lets Himself be held in the moments after. Marvin runs miserable fingers down His spine. It’s achingly, heartbreakingly close to domesticity. 

Marvin whispers, “when will you tell me your name?” 

Inevitably, the spell is broken and He pulls away. They rise. Marvin dresses. Out of the goodness of His heart, He sees Marvin to the door. Wrapped in a thin sheet, blue and yellow and amber in the night, He is Adonis. Perhaps that is His true name. Marvin wouldn’t put it past Him. 

He catches Marvin’s wrist just as the door is about to close. 

“Whizzer,” He declares. 

“Whizzer?”

A wink. “Don’t wear it out.” 

The door swings shut. 

  
V.  
  
  


The next time they crash into one another, Whizzer wrings his own name from between Marvin’s gritted teeth. Marvin tries, but fails to reproduce the same effect. 

Nevertheless, it’s a small victory; Whizzer mumbles something half-hearted about going home, and right there and then, falls asleep. 

He spends the entire night in Marvin’s arms. 

_ Blue, and yellow, and amber.  _

  
  


_ * _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so basically im impatient, part number three will also be up quite soon b/c leaving the work unfinished when all of it is already written makes me restless. hope u enjoyed as per :) x x x


	3. APPETITE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (the chapter titles got increasingly weirder, pls ignore.) im kind of iffy ab this one BUT i felt i had to round the whole thing off somehow. groups of three are always fun. x x x

I.

Whizzer likes Money. Likes shiny things. Somewhat akin to a magpie, even fond of the truly tacky, truly gaudy. 

Marvin has Money. That’s seemingly all it takes. 

At first, Whizzer plays it sly, an elegant fox sizing up a fat fowl, and Marvin senses his attack; ears of a rabbit. Daintily, Whizzer sidles up to him and bemoans his creaky mattress, his paltry shirts. Makes jabs at Marvin’s own fashion choices—“if they can even be  _ called _ fashion”. Purses his lips in disapproval. Draws empty comparisons. (What have the French got that Marvin hasn’t? Croissants? Secularism?) 

Marvin settles on the food and exoticism being the main incentive. Secularism seems to him like thinly-veiled intolerance. He’s undergone enough of his own scrutiny to last a lifetime. And that’s too long, so he’s resolved to cut himself some slack; if only on this front. 

_ No point indulging in that flavour of self-loathing, because after all, what is a man if not his religion? What is he, if not hunger? _

In the meantime, Whizzer makes a pantomime of cracking his back. 

_ Hunger drives a man to do all sorts of things.  _

When it’s made clear that Marvin gets the message, Whizzer abandons strategy all together. Strolls right into the chicken coop. Marvin, infatuated bastard that he is, lets himself be swallowed, feathers and all. 

_ The sounds of spears being sharpened; tonight, there will be a feast.  _

  
II.   
  
  


Marvin spends too much time away from home. His wife notices. Comments on it, once. 

Marvin pitches a full mug of coffee against the wall. 

His child, unfazed, continues a chess game against himself. He is smarter than both of his parents combined. It’s confounding. Mostly, it’s sad. 

His wife mops things up, and elects to not mention the subject again. 

  
  


III. 

  
  


Without meaning to, they fall into a routine of sorts. A routine in which fighting is foreplay and tetchiness is typical. The walls are far too thin for either of these activities. 

This doesn’t deter them in the slightest. 

Whizzer should be a lawyer, Marvin thinks. Get paid to argue. Or a model, paid for being a winsome smile, a pretty face. And then he thinks:  _ aren’t I paying him for these exact reasons? _ It’s too late now for guilt. Still, he cringes. Shame festers. Anger quietly takes its place. Arguments never last long. Especially not when they involve men; frustrated, devastated,  _ beautiful _ men. 

Oftentimes, it’s not even a full-blown argument that does it. It’s a scathing remark on the colour of Marvin’s tie. The pattern of Whizzer’s walls. Even a stab at flirtation which gets mistaken. More often than not, the latter, because Whizzer flirts cruelly and Marvin flirts desperately and they flirt with each other like the maggot flirts with a sweetly ripened apple.

Whizzer is both the maggot and the apple. A lethal combination. Bait easily taken. Shiny, pretty, deadly. 

And when has Marvin ever resisted a pretty face?

  
  


IV.

They are wine drunk and pliant and Whizzer smilingly admits, “sometimes I think I could kill you.” 

And Marvin can’t fault him for his bluntness, because it is not just a flight of fancy; it is a fact.

  
V.   
  
  


The divorce is inexorable. 

Marvin almost wishes he felt worse about it. 

Perhaps the worst part is the catalyst; the sheer thoughtlessness of it all. A few long lonely hours to spare. Inviting Whizzer over on a whim. Hot hands on hot hips. The rasping of lock and key. Marvin’s wife; stunned, desolate, eyes trained on her husband’s acute betrayal. Gripping firm flesh that is not her own. Laughing darkly at a joke she didn’t make. Looking only at a man, only ever looking at men. 

To her credit, she doesn’t even gasp. 

  
VI.   
  
  


Domestic bliss proves to be, as always, a bunch of tripe. 

Marvin arrives snappish and seething from work. Whizzer isn’t there. Marvin has to order takeaway.  _ I left her for this,  _ he realises.  _ I left them both for this.  _ Dumbly, he waits. The food turns sour and cold. 

The prodigal son swans in just two minutes shy of midnight. 

They fight. They feud. They fall out. Whizzer gets in his face and gets on his nerves and  _ goddamn _ him but he looks tantalising. Oozing sweat and fury. Marvin caves and interrupts himself mid-tirade. They don’t kiss; they collide. 

The next day, Marvin wakes up first. Quietly lets himself out. Makes a quick detour before work. 

Buys a fat, shiny watch. 

_ Marvin has Whizzer. That’s seemingly all it takes.  _

  
  


*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...and thats a wrap on that! it was quite short, but hopefully sweet :))) LMK what u think of it in the comments, and if uve any suggestions for anything else i could try my hand at. thanks 4 reading <3 x x

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading :^) next part will be up in a hot second, meanwhile tell me what u think in the comments. praise me, bully me, im not picky. kudos are also welcome—they fill me with an unbeatable sense of momentary validation. see u soon. x x <3


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